Nov 14, 2011

If sausage stuffing is a must on your Thanksgiving table, this recipe will not dissappoint! Lean chicken sausage is combined with celery, onion and fresh herbs to create a great tasting stuffing you won't believe is light.

I used one of my favorite lean sweet Italian chicken sausages from my local butcher, but it's hard to say what the nutritional info is without a label, so I've been using Isernio's as a guesstimate. If you follow Weight Watchers, you are saving 2 points by swapping pork sausage for lean chicken sausage and I bet no one would know the difference. I like using french bread since it's naturally fat-free and makes a great stuffing. A whole wheat loaf would also be great if you can find one.

You can make this the night before, and bake it before you are ready to serve. Leftovers should be good for about 3 days.

I ordered Williams-Sonoma turkey brine to test out on a young fresh turkey this week. Truth is we always go to my Mom's for Thanksgiving and she always makes the turkey, so I don't have too much experience with making a whole turkey. My girlfriend, a culinary school graduate, swears by Williams-Sonoma turkey brine and I've read that a brine bath ensures the most juiciest, succulent turkey, so I will let you know how it goes! I think I will be sick of Thanksgiving before it arrives this year :)

Cut the bread into 1/2-inch cubes. Spread the bread out on a baking sheet and let it dry overnight - OR - place the baking sheet in a 350°F oven and bake about 20 minutes, or until the bread is dried out. Set aside.

Preheat oven to 375°F.

In a large sauté pan, melt the butter over medium heat. Add the onion and celery and sauté, stirring occasionally, until tender and translucent, about 8 minutes. Transfer to a large bowl.

In the same pan over medium heat, cook the sausage, crumbling with a wooden spoon, until lightly browned and cooked through, about 10 minutes. Transfer the sausage to the bowl with the onion/celery mixture.

Spray an oven proof baking dish with cooking spray (I use my misto)

Add the bread, sage and thyme to the bowl with the sausage/onion mixture and stir to combine. Add the chicken broth and stir to evenly coat the bread. Adjust salt and pepper to taste and stir to mix well.

Transfer to the baking dish and bake for 30 minutes. Using a wooden spoon, gently stir. Continue baking until golden, about 35 minutes more. Serve immediately.

Makes about 9 cups.

70 comments
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Oh this looks WONDERFUL! I love stuffing. I make a "leftover" turkey since our family is so big but mine is so good they switch out grandma's (who nukes it ALL morning) for mine. Brining never did anything for mine but you make some herb and shallot butter and rub it under the skin and you never need to baste it once. Put 2 bay leaves under the skin for extra taste and a little wow factor. :)

This is great. The chicken sausage must add some nice flavor to the stuffing. I would love to hear how the brine works out. I would say that Williams Sonoma would be a pretty reliable place to get brine from.

Gina - This looks really, really good. The dressing (can't call it stuffing 'cause I don't stuff the bird) I make is very similar -- use turkey Italian sausage instead and add a few dried cranberries and a chopped Granny Smith apple, and no butter. Otherwise, herbs, broth, all the same.

As far as the turkey goes, PLEASE DO NOT NUKE!! (Sorry Mrs. although it sounds like your family doesn't like it either.) Absolutely can't see how it would be good. Roasting it or cooking it on the rotisserie works so much better. I sometimes spray my bird with olive oil - sometimes no oil or butter - and then baste it with chicken broth. Always good. Also, if roasting it, start the bird upside down and turn it over about half way through cooking time. This quite often takes two (or more) people depending on the size of the bird. (That's why I love my rotisserie.) (Also, the dog and cats think it's TV - very fun to watch them watch it.) Deborah

that stuffing looks yummy...it's just how I make mine, only I don't use sausage. I might have to try that some time. I have to agree with your friend, I will never make a turkey without a brine ever again!

You got me sold on a sausage taste with the brown rice, chicken sausage celery dressing from a week or so ago. Don't use it in my turkey stuffing but may give it a try..this looks great. So far nothing I have tried from your site has failed me. It helps so much on WW to have this kind of variety. Thanks Gina!!

I need a few experienced Thanksgiving chefs out there to give me their opinion on freezing a turkey. My friend's father-in-law passed this summer and they inherited the turkey that was in his freezer. We are having an early Thanksgiving party this weekend. I have volunteered to cook the bird. The only problem is that we dont know how old it is! Her guess is that it was bought on sale after Thanksgiving last year......but.....it might be older than that. What do you think? Give it a whirl?

Anonymous - regarding the frozen turkey, i would think if it hadn't suffered any accidental thaws in the freezer, it should be okay. i've had forgotten things in the freezer for that long and used them, just changed the cooking method some to accommodate. thaw it and see. you will be able to tell if it had spoiled as it will smell really bad. hope that helps.

Gina, the recipe says to remove the crust, but the picture looks like it has crust, can I leave the crust on and i'm sure it will soften with the chicken broth, and i'm going to buy a good loaf of multi grain Italian bread to use.

Gina, if I am making this the night before and bake it the next day do I still put the broth in? Wouldn't that make the dish soggy overnight??? I am making this for tomorrow and don't want to screw it up! Thanks for the great recipes!

Hi Gina,I absolutely love your recepies. I made this tonight for Thanksgiving. I must have done something wrong. It was super, super soggy. The breading went to mush. The top of it got nice and crispy but underneadth was smush. I wish it came out correctly, the top pieces tasted real good. I will definately try it again. FYI...All the recepies I have tried from you website have always been a hit. Happy Thanksgiving!

OMG! This recipe turned out absolutely delicious! It was my first time making stuffing and I was nervous, however, this turned out so amazing i will be making it over and over again! Thanks Gina for all of your awesome recipes!

I made this recipe for Thanksgiving and again for Christmas.. it's so close to my mom's own recipe!! I tweaked it a bit and made it my own, but Gina, you gave me the springboard, and for that, I am forever grateful. Thanks!!!! :)

Gina, you mentioned you think this would work great with cornbread, but do you think there should be any recipe modification due to the different nature of the two breads? My family is insisting on cornbread-everything this year, but the rest of this recipe sounds incredible!

Could we make this recipe in a muffin tin for bite size portions... much easier for a large family doing Thanksgiving buffet style. If so, how will the baking time change? Thanks! Can't wait for the whole family to fall in love with this one :)

I must admit I made this with cornbread. It was fabulous - the best stuffing I have ever made in 40 some odd years. I made up my cornbread recipe as usual but added the chopped sage and thyme to the batter. When it was cool, I cut the cornbread into croutons and dried them in a slow oven until crispy. I didn't have the chicken sausage, so I used less of pork sausage (8 oz) to keep the points low and it was still plenty. Sooo yummy!

I made this for Thanksgiving, instead of Bread I used my own homemade cornbread. This dish turned out phenomenal. I did have to use more cornbread to accomodate the chicken broth and I used Turkey Andouille Sausage instead of Chicken Sausage but this came out sooo wonderful!!!! Thanks so much for sharing this recipe.

I made this three years ago and both my husband and I loved it. I can not believe it is a low fat/low calorie dressing. I now make it every year for Thanksgiving. We have it with a smoked Turkey breast. Thank you so much for going through the trouble of creating this dish.

I tweaked this a bit because I didn't have a lot of time to make it (plus it was a thrifty/lazy approach). I bought the 12 ounce pack of dried and seasoned bread cubes, used around 2 3/4 cup of chicken stock, bought caramelized onion chicken sausage meatballs (super tasty BTW), and I did NOT use salt, pepper, sage or thyme (since the bread crumbs were seasoned already). Everything I else I kept the same. It was fantastic, one of the best I've had in a while! :D Thanks for the recipe!